According to CryptoPotato, a notebook paper with the phrase 'Buy Bitcoin,' which gained fame during a 2017 broadcast featuring then-US Federal Reserve Chair Janet Yellen, has been auctioned for 16 BTC, approximately $1.027 million. The auction took place at PubKey, a Bitcoin-themed bar in New York City, and was organized by auction house Scarce.City. The highest bidder, known pseudonymously as 'Squirrekkywrath,' won the sign in a week-long auction. Christian Langalis, also known as the 'Bitcoin Sign Guy,' organized the auction and attended the event. Scarce.City reported that the transaction set a record for the platform. After the platform's 15% fee, Langalis is expected to receive around $875,000, equivalent to 13.6 BTC.
The 'Buy Bitcoin' sign, written on a yellow legal pad, symbolizes Bitcoin's emergence in the global financial landscape. This physical artifact is one of the few widely recognized symbols of Bitcoin, given its primarily digital nature. The auctioned notepad also includes Langalis’ original notes and sketches of the sign from that historic day. Langalis was reportedly a 22-year-old intern at the Cato Institute at the time of the famous incident. The funds raised from the auction will support Langalis’ new venture, Tirrel Corp, which aims to create a Bitcoin Lightning network wallet on Urbit.
In 2019, Langalis created and sold 21 replicas of the iconic 'Buy Bitcoin' sign, which fetched an average price of 0.8 BTC each, approximately $51,300 per piece today. These replicas are displayed in the offices of venture firms such as Paradigm, Blockchain Capital, Castle Island Ventures, and the crypto think-tank Coin Center. After Langalis held up the sign during a 2017 House Financial Services hearing, he was escorted out of the building for violating committee rules. However, the image of the sign quickly spread across the internet. Following the event, bitcoin’s price surged by 3.7% at the time of the broadcast. Since then, bitcoin’s value has skyrocketed, going from around $2,700 in July 2017 to a peak of over $73,000 last month. This increase has been in part due to significant regulatory decisions in the United States, including allowing the launch of spot Bitcoin exchange-traded funds earlier this year.
